A general purpose computer typically allows for direct user interaction. For example, it is common for a general purpose computer to include a keyboard, a mouse and a user display, and to run a variety of user-level applications such as an e-mail application, a web browser, a word processor, and so on. For each user-level application, the heavily-provisioned operating system of the general purpose computer typically generously allocates and coordinates processor time, semiconductor memory, and access to peripheral devices, among other things.
A network attached storage (NAS) unit typically has the sole purpose of providing file-based data storage services to other computerized devices through a network. Such data storage services include file sharing, as well as file backup and restoration. The operating system of the NAS unit is typically optimized so that the NAS unit provides these data storage services to the other computerized devices in a high availability/low-latency manner.
In contrast to a general purpose computer, the NAS unit is not conveniently designed to carry out user-level general purpose computing tasks. Along these lines, the NAS unit typically runs a slimmed-down operating system and file system, and processes only I/O requests via a standard file sharing protocol (e.g., CIFS, NFS, etc.). User-level functionality such as user-level e-mail, web browsing and word processing as well as the associated drivers and support features are purposefully omitted for efficiency. As a result, user-level access to the NAS unit is exclusively through another computerized device such as a general purpose computer which connects to the NAS unit through a network.